Everything with you

Part 25

Justin

We had the York's game tomorrow evening. The team just finished a tough practice session. As Nate had mentioned a couple of days back, he was benched. His absence made it a bit tricky for us, since we had gotten so accustomed to having our star striker making our lives easier. Hence, the extra practice.

I catch my breath after doing our drills when I find a pouting Nate handing over water bottles to the players.

"Not a good look on you, man," I say as he hands over a bottle to me. He looks at me with a quizzical look.

I grab the bottle and point to his lip. "The pouting.. not a good look." He grunts, gives me the bird, and makes his way to the next team member. I just laugh when Ash joins me.

"That was a tough drill dude," he says in between pants.

I take a sip of water and answer him. "Well, we do need it to maintain our winning streak.". Ash nods, and we both look at Nate, who was back on the bench looking like a 5-year-old who was denied candy. As much as I hate not having Nate on the team tomorrow, I couldn't overrule Coach's orders. In our field, what he says goes.

Post our workout, Nate, Ash, and I head out to the parking lot through our main building together. We cross the library discussing tomorrow's field placements when I hear my name being called out. I turn around to see Emma; she's carrying almost 4 books with her bag slinged across her shoulder. She trips with trying to balance the books in her hand. She crashed to the floor along, her books flying on the floor. I rush to her side and help her get up.

"Are you okay?" I ask as I hold her arm to help her up. She looks at me and just laughs.

"I tripped," she says in between laughs. Her laugh is so infectious it makes me grin like an idiot.

"Yes, you did." I pick up her bag. As we stood up, Nate and Ash were now before us, holding Emma's books, which had fallen.

"Hi.. You must be Emma. I'm Nate," says Nate, handing over her books. Ash does the same quietly.

"Hi!" Emma says with a smile.

"That's Ash," I say, pointing at him. He just waves at Emma.

She waves back to him with a bright smile. Ash reciprocates with a stiff smile and looks at me.I tilt my head and give him the "Is that the best you can do?" look. He simply shrugs. I shake my head and shift my focus to Emma.

"Okay, now that we are done with introductions... What are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be in the studio now?"

"Yes, I was supposed to, but Sophia had an emergency. Today's class was cancelled. I wanted to check out a few books beforee," she suddenly became quiet.

I raised my eyebrow. "Before what?".

"Um.. can we maybe talk for a bit? she asks me". I give her a nod. I look back to Nate and Ash, who are grinning like idiots looking between us.

"You guys can go. I'll catch you tomorrow," I say.

Nate says, "Alright! It was nice meeting you, Emma." and moves ahead with Ash, who again just gives us a nod. Ash really needed to improve his communication skills, especially since he was on his way to being a lawyer. The guy barely says a full sentence to any of us.

"Justin ?". I'm pulled back to reality by Emma's voice.

"Yeah.. sorry." I grab the books from her hand. We decide to visit the coffee shop on campus.

Once we were seated with our drinks. I begin speaking.

"Do you have a big assignment coming up? Why do you have so many books?" I question again.

"I wanted to check out a few books before I left home this weekend," she says, looking at her drink.

"You're going home? When ?", I asked surprised. I hadn't known she had plans to go to her home this week.

"My friend's getting married this weekend. More like a family friend. So I planned to fly out this weekend. ", she was looking nervous.

"Okay.. why do you look so nervous about that?"

"Well, I need to ask you something." she says, looking more nervous. Her tone makes me uneasy.

I sit up straight and say, "Okay, shoot."

"The friend who's getting married is the elder sister of my ex-boyfriend Noah."

"Oh.."

She takes another deep breath. "My mom was trying to set me up with him again. We kind of got into an argument when I told her about you. I mean.. us."

I found her nervousness amusing. I give her a nod, allowing her to continue.

"Okay.. so she kind of asked me if you will be coming to the wedding as my date, and I said yes." She says so quickly that I almost don't understand what she means.

"But... you don't have to come. I can manage.. obviously you must be busy. I'll make up some excuse and manage things. Please don't worry," she rambles on without letting me speak. I wait till she's finished.

"When's the wedding, Emma?" I ask.

"Saturday evening," she says, sipping her coffee.

"When do you plan to leave? How will you go?"

"I was thinking about flying out Friday evening, but I haven't booked anything yet."

"Okay.. I'm free this weekend. Do you want me to come with you?" I say.

She's caught off guard by my question, "I.. um.. what?" No.. I can go alone.. seriously, you don't have to come, Justin.".

"I would like to attend the wedding with you, Emma. Unless you don't want me to go."

She stays quiet for a bit, probably thinking why I agreed to go with her. Usually I wouldn't go, but the way she nervously asked me, that actually made me want to go. I also didn't work this week, so I had no other plans.

"Are you sure? You would come? Cause I don't want to intrude," she says again.

"I'm fine with it, Emma. I want to go with you," I assure her and hold her hand.

"Okay," she says with a smile. I reach over the counter and give her a quick kiss on her lips.

"Okay..but didn't you have a game this week?"

"Yeah, the game's on Friday. When's the wedding?" I ask again.

"It's on Saturday evening," she says, sipping her coffee, looking worried.

"Hmm.. the game will end late on Friday.. Can we start to your hometown on Saturday morning? We can start really early and reach there by afternoon. Is that okay?"

"I don't think we have any flights on Saturday morning. If do, then it'll be just an hour of journey."

"Why don't we drive? It'll take about 5-6 hours, right?". I suggest.

"Drive? In your car?" she asks surprised.

"Yes," I answer.

"I don't want to trouble you, Justin. I can really just go on my own. I don't want to put you outt," she says with her tone full of concern.

"It's no trouble, Emma. I'll go. It'll be a fun roadtrip!!" I say excitedly.

She laughs at my enthusiasm and nods her head. I honestly didn't mind the weekend getaway. Don was planning to spend the weekend at our house to bond with Jo. I didn't want to spend any more time with him than I needed to. So I took the chance anyway since I also get to spend the weekend with Emma. Although it was too soon to meet the parents, Emma looked really uncomfortable talking about her parents. I wanted to help her out too.